Weight of the World
by WolfLuvr1977
Summary: How can the team talk down a subject who believes he has lost everything when they are dealing with the weight of the world in their own personal lives? Please R & R as always!
1. Rough Morning

**So this isn't set at any specific time period but it is sometime after Leah mysteriously disappeared from the team. Don't forget to review! (P.S.: I don't own Flashpoint or anything associated with it's amazingness!)**

"We're going to have to let you go." These words hit Mitchell Anderson like a 70 car train. 37 years of working at the same company, the same desk, the same people and with 8 simple words it was all over. The images of his 4 children flashed through his head as his boss tried to give him reasons and answers. His youngest was graduating high school in a few short months and his oldest two were already in private schools in the States.

Mitchell robotically shook his boss' hand and scribbled his name on a few papers before going to collect his things. When he got to his cubicle, he quietly surveyed the things that had accumulated on his desk. The picture of his family that they had got when his youngest was born. The drawings that his children made on his white board during take your child to work days. The computer piece that he had been working on not an hour before. Everything had its own story. Everything had to go.

Hand shaking, Mitchell violently threw objects into the box that he had been given. Some things broke, papers were torn and crumpled. His coworkers peered over their cubicle walls to see what all the commotion.

"37 years!" Mitchell yelled, continuing to shove things into the box, "37 damn years and its like it didn't even mean anything!"

Everyone in the general vicinity had all dropped what they were doing to watch the scene. Marsha, the receptionist, had finally walked over to Mitchell's cubical, "You alright Mitch?"

"He lied!" he said through clenched teeth, more to himself than to her.

"Who lied?" Marsha stepped forward, "Mitch did they let you go?"

"What do you think!" he snapped. Marsha took a few steps back. She was a very nice person and had never been shouted at by anyone in the office, until now. Mitchell could see that he had upset the redheaded receptionist but he had bigger problems on his mind. He finally gave up on packing and swept his box off of his desk. He brushed off friends who tried to talk to him on is way out of the building.

As he got into his car he threw the box onto the passenger seat. He sat behind the steering wheel staring out of the window. Not at anything particular, just staring, thinking, wondering. He was surprised to feel hot tears forming in his eyes, not of sadness, of anger. After a while he pulled his cell phone out of his pocket and dialed. The line went strait to voicemail. Now even angrier, Mitchell threw the phone into the box with the rest of his belongings.

It was then that he noticed the glove box had somehow been opened, and inside sat his handgun. Slowly, Mitchell reached over and picked it up. The cold metal warmed in his clenched fist as he contemplated his next move. If he couldn't get answers over the phone, he would just have to get them in person.

Marsha had just gotten out of the front doors when she saw Mitchell's car peeling out of the parking lot. Disappointed at herself for missing him she looked down at the picture frame that Mitch had left behind., the faces of his children smiled back at her through the glass.

Earlier that morning, Wordy kissed all of his girls goodbye as they slept and silently crept out of the house. He quietly got into his car and carefully shut his door. He was about to start the car when he noticed Ally's car seat in the back from the grocery trip they had taken together the night before. He laughed to himself as he remembered her repeated demands for a cookie.

After taking out the car seat and placing it on the garage floor he got back in his car and started for work. The drive to the station was always the worst part of the day for Wordy. Not only was he leaving his girls for 12 hours straight, he never knew if he would be making the drive home at the end of the day. Sure, everyone had their worries about accidents and such, anyone could die at any second, but Wordy and every other police officer, fire fighter and soldier had even less of a chance of making it through the day alive.

Pulling into a spot towards the front of the station Wordy spotted Sam locking up his bike on the rack, and honestly, he looked like shit. The young cop looked like he had stayed up all night with a crying baby (Wordy would know). He had dark circles under his eyes and his hair hadn't been tended to. Sam did however manage to shave, most likely a habit from the military where facial hair is rarely tolerated.

Sam finished locking his bike up to the rack and couldn't help but yawn when he was greeted by Wordy.

"Rough night Sammy?" the older cop asked.

"You could say that" Sam said, avoiding details. The pair went inside the SRU Headquarters and joined Spike, Ed and Parker in the locker room. The others noticed Sam's more disheveled appearance and, of course, all had something to say.

Once they had finished changing into their workout clothes they started headed over to the gym where Jules was already running on the treadmill with her headphones blasting country music into her ears. However, Ed called Sam back into the locker room just as he was about to head out of the door.

"You alright Sam?" he asked after Sam had slowly turned around to face his team leader.

Sam was silent. He was facing Ed but his eyes were somewhere else. Ed could see that he was obviously not alright, but the young sniper was never going to admit it. "Sam if something's going on in your personal life that's going to affect the job you need to tell me".

Sam remembered the last time he had kept something from Ed and how angry it had made his team leader. Secrets were not a good idea in a team, or in a family. "It's my mom," he finally said in a low voice, "She's sick."

Ed let out a small sigh and bowed his head. "I'm sorry buddy," he said, placing a comforting hand on his teammate shoulder, "How serious is it?"

"Cancer" he said, finally looking into his team leader's eyes, "Their not sure how bad it is yet, but the odds aren't great"

"I hate to say this buddy but I have to recommend that you take the day off" Ed allowed for an appropriate pause before saying this, giving the new information a chance to settle in. Sam relaxed his shoulders and sighed, turning away from Ed.

"Ed, I can't go home," he said in a more firm voice, "I just spent the last 6 hours there thinking about what's going to happen to my family. I can't go back…not yet."

"Sam-"

"Look, I just need to get myself going, get my mind off of it," Sam interrupted, "If something comes up today I'll stay in the truck."

Ed sighed, he looked into his youngest team member's eyes and he could see this wasn't stubbornness, it was desperation. "Alright," he said nodding his head, "But you need to stay focused, and after today you're taking the next week off to go see your family."

"Yes Sir." Sam was only able to give Ed a quick nod before the alarm started echoing all around the locker room.

"Team One, Hot Call" Kira's voice came over the intercom.

"Nothing but a bright at early emergency to keep your mind off of your troubles" Ed gave Sam a friendly slap on the back before heading to his locker to suit up.

Sam smiled, but he could feel the weight of the world crushing down on him and himself ready to break.

**So I have some idea as to where I'm going with this but any and all suggestions and feedback is appreciated. Thank You So Much For Reading!**


	2. On the Scene

Mitchell got more and more frustrated as he tried to make his way through downtown traffic. It should be around lunch time by now, usually he would be heading to Marco's, the little Italian place across from his work. But today, his friends will be gathering there without him. He hadn't taken his hand off of the gun. He used it as somewhat of a stress ball as he got cut off and honked at.

As he was stopped at a red light his phone rang. He set the gun on the seat next to him and looked at the caller ID. It was Emily, his oldest. He couldn't tell her, not yet, he had to get things straight first, he had to know why. But at the same time, he couldn't make her think that anything was wrong, he answered the phone.

"Hello?" he tried his best to keep his voice from shaking.

"Hi Daddy!" he could tell she was excited about something

"Hey sweetie, what's up?" he didn't think he wanted to hear what she was so excited about; it probably meant he needed more money.

"I got in!" he could see her smiling from end to end on the other side of the phone. She had wanted to get into Stanford since she started high school and she worked so hard to get there. He was happy for her, but he couldn't help but feel more hot tears form in his eyes. He'd never be able to afford Stanford now.

"That's great sweetie…" he said through his frustration.

"And also-"

"Why don't you tell me all about it at dinner tonight?" Mitchell cut her off, unable to stand hearing her so happy. This would crush her.

"Oh, okay." She said, her elatedness now deflated, "I'll see you tonight then. Love you!"

"Love you too." He didn't say goodbye before hanging up the phone. He was now more determined than ever to get to his destination.

The team geared up and piled into the trucks. Ed knew that if he put Sam in a truck with Jules she'd want to talk about what's bothering him, but like Sam said, he needed a distraction. Ed though about putting him in with Spike, but with his history of sick parents, it wouldn't do a damn thing. Ed already knew the situation so putting him in his truck wouldn't work and since Sam wasn't in a condition to be driving and Greg would be too busy trying to figure everything out to drive, the only solution was Wordy.

Of course it was Wordy, the happiest guy on the team. Big family, beautiful wife, great attitude, it was perfect. "Sam, you're riding with Wordy today."

Sam gave a slight nod, and Spike was somewhat confused by the change in truck partners but with only one slightly goofy confused face he made his way over to Jules, who shot a look in Sam's direction. He only gave a small smile and turned his eyes to the ground before climbing into the passenger side of Wordy's truck.

As they drove downtown, Kira relayed the details of the situation. Single gunman, caucasian, approximately 45. One shot fired on the 23rd floor of an office building, company name: Burnham Security. He is believed to be in a conference room where he is holding several hostages. Motive and main target is not known at this time.

"Did you see the game last night?" Wordy asked Sam after Kira was done. Wordy could tell something was bothering him, and that if was going to affect his performance; why else would Ed be switching people around? He also know that the best thing to do would be to get his mind off of anything bad, and last night's game was far from bad.

"I did." Sam said. He had just finished celebrating the winning goal when he got the call from his sister. "Wait you watched it? I would think you would be watching the Princess Bride or My Little Pony or something." For the first time that day, Sam smiled.

"Well Shelly took the girls out for pizza just before I got home so I had a couple of hours to myself." Wordy explained, glad to see Sam brightening up, "But of course they got home during the fourth quarter and had me trying to explain the rules just as the teams tied."

"That was some fourth quarter…" Sam and Wordy talked about the game all the way to the building. Occasionally they would be interrupted with extra information from the boss or Kira, or orders from Ed.

By the time Sam jumped out of his truck his mind was split between hockey and the job. By the time he climbed stepped into the op truck with Spike, his mind was on the subject. Spike swiveled in his chair and shifted his eyes from left to right.

"Whaat are you doing in the truck…?" Spike asked skeptically.

"I'm Sarge's second today, don't you listen when they're giving assignments?" Sam said, taking his place in the chair next to his colleague.

"All I hear is 'blah blah Spike in the truck blah blah blah'" Spike said before he turned back to his computer screen.

Spike worked on getting eyes and ears into the building while Sam pulled up floor plans and sent them to the teams PDAs.

"Boss, we got eyes but no ears," Spike finally announced on the radio, "But the video is choppy, it's got a low frames per second ratio and the images are pretty pixilated."

"What kind of security company puts their worst products in their own headquarters?" Wordy asked.

"Maybe one that can't afford an upgrade," Jules chimed in.

Ed gathered the team and assigned entry positions. Wordy, Jules, and the Boss would take the elevator all the way up, while Ed got off on the floor before and took the stairs up, which acted as a back entrance and a Scorpio position since the windows were too tinted for a sniper shot.

"Boss, it looks like the subjects escalating," Spike said as the team reached the 12th floor, "He grabbed one of the hostages, looks like the boss, he was sitting at the head of the table. But he's out of frame, we lost eyes on him."

The team grew anxious as they rode higher and higher up the elevator.

"I put together some of the witness statements," Sam said, "It looks like the subject grabbed Arthur Doyle, the CEO of the company. He scheduled a meeting for today for all of the department heads."

"Have we regained eyes on the subject yet?" Parker asked.

"Negative," Spike said nervously.

Finally the elevator made it to the 22nd floor and Ed got off, not a few seconds later the rest of the team got on the 23rd. They swiftly made their way to the conference room which was set in the middle of the floor with glass walls. They ducked behind cubicles and hid behind walls as they discretely made their way to the subject.

However, when they made their way over to the conference room, all they found were hostages laying face down on the floor with their hands behind their backs. There was no gunman in sight and no Arthur Doyle either.

The team searched the floor and found and found nothing. They reconvened at the conference room. Ed was the first to speak, "We were watching the stairs, we were in the elevator. Where the hell did they go?"


End file.
